


Creation Or A Stain

by aquandrian



Category: Joseph Arthur (Musician)
Genre: F/M, real person fiction - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-30
Updated: 2015-10-30
Packaged: 2018-04-28 22:26:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5107889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aquandrian/pseuds/aquandrian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mary Sue meets Joseph Arthur.</p><p>When I get hit, I get hit.</p><p>This time it's Joseph Arthur pr0n. Only it turned out to be not so much pr0n as a love story. Eek. Just a silly sappy exercise of the imagination.</p><p>Disclaimer: Didn't happen, never met him, never did this. Probably couldn't reach, such being the height difference.</p><p>Originally posted at http://aquandrian.livejournal.com/175107.html</p>
            </blockquote>





	Creation Or A Stain

You’re not an attractive man. In fact, at times I’m repulsed. And these are only ever the times when you’re silent in word and chord, bereft of your frenetic fascinating guitar. You’re far too tall for me, have distinctly boring hair, and you never ever, ever, take off those sunnies. I always think they do you no favours and then I see that one picture of you without them and realise just how much you do need them.

Oh yes, harsh and shallow. Defining characteristic of a born fangirl.

But I adore you from vowel to chord to brush stroke. And in the strange thrilling tumult of a new album, I fall deeper and deeper, find a new debauched depth to this obsession. I dream dizzying lovescapes of discovery and desire and delirium.

We’d meet, you and I, in a club of chocolate leather and violet velvets, drapes of red in the corners, oddly twisted chandeliers that glow most shyly and barely lighten the gloom. I’d be there for a gig, not yours someone else. Maybe with a couple of friends, it’d be a Saturday night when I’ve relaxed and put a good amount of time between myself and the tedious work week.

The city’d be a comfortable exhilarating sea of lights, beautiful young people tripping along the streets lined with old sandstone buildings wedged between the steel and glass skyscrapers. Me in my jeans and sexy top, high strappy heels in celebration of summer and my hair all bouncy and shiny because I’m too happy to be young and out to care.

And we’d meet at the bar in between bands. A happy coincidence that doesn’t seem anything but a mild bizarre moment when we turn and look at each other in the same second. Normally, I’d look right past you, cool my expression and turn all my happiness onto the bar staff. Normally, you might do the same.

But it’s a lovely night and something about your face in the shadows strikes me as harmless so I smile and say “Having a good night?” You smile back, absurdly sleepy around your deep gold aviators, “Yeah. And you?”

Oh, I never twig. I love your voice instantly but I have no idea why. Too caught up in the heady excitement of an ephemeral summer night, I forget that I have a history or even a future. So it never occurs to me that I have actually heard your incredibly sardonic drawl before, that I’ve loved it and yearned for it and felt safest when your voice wraps around me in the darkness.

All I do is beam, bounce a little on my heels and say “God, yeah. Isn’t the band great? Have you seen them before?”

Maybe you have, maybe you haven’t. If the city was Sydney, you might not have and so I could continue the conversation, telling you all about the bands I’ve seen and which ones I like and which ones I can’t stand. If it was New York, ohhhhhh if it was New York …

Say it is. Say I’m there on holiday with good friends and my cool musician friend has dragged us most willingly to this club or café and there you are with a few friends, just relaxing with some good music.

So I ask you if you’ve seen the band before and you tell me if you have and then you tell me about the local bands I should see and shouldn’t see and what you think of them all. I’m high enough on the alcohol and music to sit beside you with my drink and be utterly fascinated by all you have to tell me.

And then something does click and I say with absolute delighted certainty “You’re a musician. Aren’t you?” And that’s a challenge, not a doubt. You grin. “Yep, guilty.” I laugh, crow a little, then struck by inspiration, leap to my feet and grab your arm. “Do you mind coming over to meet my friends? It’s just that one of them lives here and is a musician and I’m sure you two could totally exchange info and tips and all that, y’know. D’you mind? I know I’m being incredibly pushy and feel free to tell me to fuck off but I just thought I should ask, y’know? I mean, you’ve got to know how hard it is to make connections in a city as big as this. Right?”

How you understand all that I have no idea and maybe you don’t. But I think I’ve charmed you and you’re a nice enough guy to agree. You get to your feet, I look all the way up and still don’t twig. Stick my hand out with a suitably cheeky smile. “By the way, hi. I’m Dri.”

Well, actually I use my real name. And like most people, you tilt your head and say it wrong. So I correct you, enunciating both parts properly and you properly compliment me on having such a pretty name. I roll my eyes, say something sarcastic and wait for you to introduce yourself.

“Joe,” you say in your very distinctive precious to my heart voice, standing there, all tall and dark with your rose gold shields, and I like a mad butterfly nod and drag you over to my friends. Totally clueless.

Oh Christ, it would be hysterical if they recognised you and realised I had no idea. Maybe they do. Lord knows I’ve bombarded them with lyrics and the odd song and some pictures and incessant babble for them to realise a lot sooner than me. But would they say something?

Not unless I let them get a word in edgewise. I engage you and my musician friend in conversation, then beam madly as you two hit it off. She probably thinks I’m insane, sitting there, all chirpy and totally unselfconscious, totally unlike myself, while she talks to the musician I hold closest to my melodramatic heart. Or she’s very proud of me for not quivering in a corner.

As it is, I don’t allow much time for anyone to have a word in my ear about this musician called Joe. More alcohol, more bands, more conversation. And we talk and talk and talk. You tell me about Tom Waits, I tell you about Jason Pierce. You tell me about Jack Kerouac, I tell you about Neil Gaiman. You tell me about God, I tell you about Donnie Darko.

Nothing more of a lovedrug than conversation. And when I realise I’m dizzyingly close to crushing on this musician I’ve just met, I catch my breath and make up an excuse to go to the loo. There, I look at myself in the mirror, unnaturally sallow in the fluorescent lights, and tell myself sotte voce not to be a moron, to go pay some attention to my friends and to focus on the music. Life is more than boys, yes.

When I come out, I go sit very far away from you, engage a friend of a friend in conversation, all happy and casual. Cross my jeaned legs, swing my strappy high heeled foot and wonder treacherously if you’re watching. This amuses me too much so I glance across at you and you are watching. A slow exchanged grin that makes me go all sorts of happy hot colours. We return to our conversations.

It takes another four looks for you to come over. I school my expression to startled politeness. You lean down and ask us if we’d like another drink. “Oh god, yes.” And as you walk away, I’m grinning like a twit cos you are so utterly cool and I’m so glad we met.

What impresses me the most is that when you bring us the drinks, you flash a cheeky little smile and go back to your seat. I’m hooked, instantly wanting to follow you and knowing I shouldn’t, knowing I should bide my time just a little. Argh, fuckit. I never could play games for very long.

Follow my butterfly instincts, I bounce up and trot over to you. “Hallo”, I chirp and shamelessly wiggle my way between you and my friend. You might make some laughing remark, I might retort about my size and brazen behaviour. My friends just roll their eyes. And you return to your conversation with the other person. Which suits me fine, I’ll just wait until your attention turns naturally and inevitably to me.

Conversations in the deep sensual shades, little gold fixtures glowing on the textured walls. The bands finish and mingle with the crowd, a dj spinning records in the corner. Usually I’d be eyeing some recently de-staged musician, blatantly zeroing in on him in his indie understated finery. But this one night, when you finally turn to me, the conversations enthral me completely.

The music is at that particular decibel for us to scoot closer together, listening intently, laughing at shared sarcasm and silliness. We don’t have enough in common to freak me out nor are we so far apart to disturb me. Naturally, you and I would have interests that fit in perfection.

I notice your face to realise I’m not physically attracted to you and dismiss that instantly. But we’re still in shadow and I’m still too daft not to recognise you for yourself. My initial fear of intimacy has vanished in the burn of curiosity and I need to know more, as much as you’ll tell me. And you do, in that oh so droll American voice of yours. We talk about friends and family, relationships as we’ve seen and felt, we seem to understand each other.

And eventually you mention your art. My attention snagged all over again, I scoot in closer and ask with wide eyes. I holler at my two artistic friends to come over, neither are surprised but they’re cool enough to humour my astonishment. So I watch you talk about your art to them both, the three of you discuss things like perspective and gouache and texture and I’m quite sure I’ve fallen in love with you.

Oh, you know this. By now, I can’t and don’t want to conceal it. Yes, I confess it with suitable irony and you grin at me, that silly sheepish expression. We fall into discussing your individual paintings. I tell you, ruefully, about my halting experiments in digital art. And it’s mid way through you describing this one vivid piece to me that I stop, look at you and say “Do you live very far away?”

You blink. “No, not really.”

“Are your paintings there?”

Now it begins to dawn. “Yes,” you say warily.

I give you a sort of sheepish smile. “Do you mind if a total stranger gets very presumptuous and asks if she can come over to see your paintings?”

I want very much for this ploy to work. And I can see you calculating safety and motives behind your eyes. Suddenly you do look at me as a stranger and I try my very best to appear sane and harmlessly interested. Cos it is New York and we have only just met and who knows what psycho people try to follow you home?

In some marvellous twist, you decide to call my bluff. “Sure. You want to come over now?”

That’s exactly what I want. But I’m still startled to question your motives in return. Ah, the mind games we imagine. I look closely at you, as if in that one moment it’ll become clear to me whether you’d cut my head off and stick me in your closet, and I listen carefully for any doubt or warning bell in my mind.

But, no, I have a phone and I have cash. I can catch a cab and possibly I’m a little too drunk to be making these sorts of decisions. But I make up my mind and nod happily. “Absolutely. Let’s go.”

Oddly, my friends make no protest. Puzzled, I follow you out of the club, trying to figure out exactly why I wasn’t subjected to the third degree, why they didn’t even try to wrestle your address from you. Gosh, it’s almost hurtful, that casual acceptance that I was about to swan off with some total male American stranger.

Naturally I say this to you, defusing any awkwardness that may have happened. We joke about serial killers, try to outdo each other with ghastly scenarios waiting back at your apartment. Walking New York streets with you, I’m happy to be short and dark beside you, scuttling to keep up with your long legs, trying not to twist my ankle or break my leg on the uneven pavements.

We reach East 19th. You punch in a security code. And in the bright overhead light, I see you clear for the first time and nearly keel over in shock. “In we go,” you say cheerily and it’s too late, too late for me to run down the street, shrieking in fannish hysteria. Numb, I let you usher me in, trying to cover my reaction by looking around at the foyer, at the elevator, hoping and hoping I don’t look as stunned mullet as I feel.

But you do notice. “You all right?”

“Fine,” I croak.

I just realised I’ve spent the last three hours chewing the ear off my most revered and beloved musician, totally oblivious to his identity, and now I’m riding up the elevator to his apartment, exactly when should I hyperventilate?

“Fine,” I say, “just, y’know, realised what a psychopath you could be.”

I think you hear the sobriety under the flippant tone because you look closely at me. “I can take you back if you want.”

“No,” I say, suddenly indignant with my own silliness. “No, you’ve been nice enough to invite me up and I do want to see your stuff so here we go. We’re totally doing it.”

“Seeing the art,” I clarify, “your art. That’s what we’re doing.”

Now you’re laughing at me. I glance up to see that playful grin around your mouth. Oh, I do adore you. “Shut up, you. Lookit, I’m coming up to see your etchings, aren’t I? D’you actually have any?”

You pretend to think. “Er, maybe?”

“Ha, I knew it. Luring me back here under false pretences of art to chain me up as your exotic sex slave.”

“Yeah. Right.”

“What, are you saying I’m not exotic or I’m not sex slave material?”

Bickering eases my nerves, or so I tell myself. Down the corridor, I blink at the sight of cream carpet and feel some pity for the sorry ass who has to clean away inevitable mud tracks. Oh, your apartment is lovely. It’s so … you.

Dark walls, big windows on the city lights, fairy lights strung up in a beautiful glow of reds and golds and blues, warm deep couches strewn with odd cushions and rugs tossed across the wooden floorboards. And your paintings everywhere. I forget all my hysteria, entranced by the impenetrable cryptic sights of your mind, disturbing yet comforting because they’re all part of you and I’ve never felt threatened by the way you express yourself. Forgetting myself, I use your name the way I always have. “Oh Joseph …”

Your expression twitches only a little, a tiny frown between your brows. I just grin and come over. “So that’s the painting you were telling me about?”

And we fall into conversation, easy pattern of question and answer and joke and laughter and shared stories. While you get us a couple of drinks, I curl up on a couch and admire all the pretty coloured lights throwing patterns across the floor. It’s a lovely comforting riot of colours and I smile at you with such affection because it’s so You.

But it’s not the couch for you. Stretch your long legs out on the rug, you lean against the couch and glance up at me. I can’t resist, grab my drink and scoot down beside you. There are pens on the side table and somehow we get to talking about tattoos. I show you mine, ask you if you have any because I quite honestly have no idea. It’s never occurred to me. You probably do and you show me.

“Did you draw those yourself?” I ask. Of course you did. Somehow you’re drawing on me and this seems perfectly natural. Intricate curves and faces on the inside of my unmarked wrist. You uncap the coloured ones and fill in the spaces, detail the shapes with smaller shapes. And eventually I realise we’re not talking any more.

“Joseph,” I say softly. You glance at me, your face very close, shades utterly translucent in this light. “Put some music on,” I ask. You roll away, get to your feet and I curl in, abruptly quite sober and aware this might head in directions unexpected.

And that’s all right. I’ll trust my instincts because I know you will too. We won’t go wrong.

What do you put on? Unsurprisingly, I wish you’d put your own music on because that’s what makes me most relaxed, happiest. But of course you wouldn’t. So it’s some acoustic guitar I don’t recognise, a female vocalist with a lovely depth to her voice. I ask who she is, you tell me and I file the name away to investigate later.

We talk about symbols, those that mean something personal to us, the universal ones, our own interpretations. And you never stop drawing, your head always bent, occasional glances at me that sometimes linger, spark with a smile. And I wonder when exactly to tell you that the insides of my arms are my most erogenous zones. Part of me even wonders with magnificent paranoia if you know this already.

The scrape of the broad pen tip makes me shiver deep, the sound and feel and shape of it. You know exactly how to move it, clear definite curves and lines. You never hesitate and I know it’s all fluid, spontaneous instinctive movements of your wrist and fingers. The narrow tip of the fine pen makes me tense, the keening precise line that circles and swerves and swoops up the thin skin of my inner arm. I may pull in a small breath, make a soft sound but you don’t react. I watch you write my name in slanted script up the centre. A swirl, a flourish. And you write your name just below. A little stick figure with big bug eyes next to your name. And a little stick figure with wiggly hair and a pen beside mine. I’ve told you I’m a writer.

My chuckle makes you grin. We smile at each other in a moment of loveliness. And you say nothing when I ease your shades off. I could kiss you then, maybe you half expect it. But I lose my nerve at the last moment and simply place your shields on the side table, half turning away to hide my too expressive face.

Because even now I don’t know where this will go, whether I do want to cross so many lines with you. Or whether I even can. I have never lusted after your body. Your mind, your heart, your soul, yes. But never the flesh.

We still talk, about movies and the images that stayed with us. And eventually you’ve covered my inner arms with ink. I’m telling you about the golden spiral when we realise this and without thinking, I tug your other wrist towards the pen. This suits you fine, listening to me as you draw little spirals across the pale taut flesh of your arm.

You do have lovely arms, I think with a slight shock. Yes, former junkie compact tense muscle. And I want you drawing back on me. So, still talking, I turn my back to you and tug my top over my head. Seem silly not to shuck the bra then. A cushion under my bare breasts and I fold my arms, let you detail maths symbols across my shoulder blade. Now you repeat certain words back to me and I know that’s what you’re shaping on my skin. Those pens have become so dear to me, fine trails and broad sweeps of meaningful wetness across the grain and canvas of my flesh.

And then you talk to me, tell me about your more intimate family stories, stories I had half heard and half suspected. I know when you draw the noose low on my spine, feel the corners of the cross just under my shoulder blade. You tell me stories I never expected to hear, this sort of intimacy that makes me shiver with the power to hurt.

When your inexpressible quietly wounded voice falls silent, I take the pen from you. Cushion to my breasts, I tell you to take off your shirt and lie down. Nothing so beautiful as a man who obeys with such perfect ironic faith. I look at the long lovely curve of your naked back, the angled contour of your shoulders. And I write you a story.

There was once a boy. And a girl. Each born of cruel or silent words, each seared with indelible images. Apart, they withdrew, knowing themselves damaged. But each walked towards the light, he to the flame in a stained glass window, she to a secular computer glow. He found religion and music, she found atheism and fiction.

“And they met?” you ask, your mouth against the curve of your bare arm.

“And they met and knew each other.”

I halt, pen above your skin, caught in the headlights of a narrative. Breathe. Just breathe and let it breathe through you. Just write.

And they loved and wrote and made music, made art and laughed and cried together in a big dark house where the rooms filled with their children of word and vowel and chord and swirl. The boy and the girl lived in the light and they were red and blue and gold fairy colours.

“The end,” I say and make that final full stop just above your right hip. Lay down the pen, I look at your back all covered with my irregular slanted looping script and it’s a jolt of astonishing eroticism. My Joseph covered in my words.

“No.”

I blink, watch you push yourself up and off your elbows. My words shift and move in the faint coloured glow, almost like they’re disappearing into your skin, sinking into the bone and grain of your spine.

“No?” I echo stupidly.

You glance partly over your shoulder and I realise with the way you don’t actually look at me that I’m sitting there, bare breasted and half naked. Snatch up the cushion like a ninny, I cross my legs and try to look somewhat sophisticated. “You don’t like my ending, why is this? Did I criticise your use of perspective?”

You give me that slow sleepy smile as you turn and now I can see us kissing, sometime in the near future.

“It’s not an ending,” you explain.

And then I do kiss you. Cos you’re silly and soppy and I adore that you didn’t actually say the trite words. We make love on the rugs in the scent of ink and alcohol, it’s strange and unfamiliar and a little awkward but that seems all right. Because I curve my arm around your neck and your face nestles perfect against my throat. Because I look down and your hand against my breast looks right and beautiful.

I think of your colourful guitar and remember that ha, I do lust after your body. I lust after your hands. Working artist hands with musician calluses and smudges of ink and stained with paint, charcoal caught under the blunt nails. Your beautiful ever creating hands. On me.

That’s the shape and melody of our story. Should I choose to create.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is indeed a Joseph Arthur song, off Come To Where I'm From.


End file.
